


Sharon's Christmas Pony

by elfhawk3



Category: A-Babies Vs. X-Babies
Genre: Family, Friendship, Gen, Kid Fic, Misses Clause Challenge, Parenthood, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-09
Updated: 2013-12-09
Packaged: 2018-01-04 04:59:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1076812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elfhawk3/pseuds/elfhawk3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Scenes from the evolution of a bear and how Steve Rogers came to have him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sharon's Christmas Pony

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Amy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amy/gifts).



> with many thanks to [smaller/notpotable](http://archiveofourown.org/users/smaller) for the beta

Christmas morning brought the elder Carter daughter early to her parents’ bedroom.

“Christmas, Mum!” she said, clambering up onto the bed and excitedly shoving at every shoulder she could reach in an excitement-fueled whirlwind of energy. “Christmas, Da! Presents! Santa ate the cookies!”

“Your turn, Mandy,” the man groaned sleepily, butting his head against his wife’s arm. “I dealt with Sharon and her teething problem last night; you deal with Margaret-monster here.”

“No!” the girl said, crawling across the bed away from her mother.

Her father huffed sharply as a pointy knee caught him in the stomach. “Don’t jump around on the bed, Peggles,” he scolded.

“You said morning! It’s sunny!” She pointed to the window curtains, silhouetted with the dim light of dawn. Amanda took the distraction and caught her rampaging eldest by the foot before another flailing limb could injure anything too severely.

“No!” shrieked little Sharon from the crib. “No!”

“You get Sharon then, Harry darling,” Amanda said, dragging her daughter back towards the head of the bed. “Mademoiselle Margaret and I will get breakfast started and then,” she had to raise her voice over the girl’s protesting cries, “and THEN, we will do presents.”

“No!” Sharon shrieked from the crib again.

“You’re a cruel woman, Amanda Carter,” he said as he rolled over onto his back. “I will remember this.”

“Oh of course.” She leaned over to kiss him before hefting Peggy into the air, foot first. “As I recall, your chosen battlefield is tic-tac-toe. I’ll have Peggy arrange the dueling ground on the fridge again.”

She shot him a finger gun before sauntering out of the room, her giggling daughter twisting in an attempt to right herself.

“I want pancakes before our showdown!” he called after her retreating form as he got up.

“No!” Sharon cried again, her voice weaker.

He leaned over the crib. Little Sharon was sucking on the hoof of one of the many plush ponies sharing space with her. Her eyes were red from the sleepless night of crying she had had and her blonde fuzz spiked in all directions from where she had been tugging on it. “Sherry-baby, I know you know other words. How about something else? Can you say ‘Da’?” he asked, pulling the toy away.

“No! Pony!” she said, reaching for the toy even as he lifted her out of the crib.

“You know the rule, no ponies with food. Applejack doesn’t get to come to breakfast.” He popped her teething ring into her mouth and she gummed on it noisily. “See if that doesn’t make you feel better than Applejack’s ear.”

****

“And now, for the last, this is from Uncle Buchanan,” Amanda said, pushing a large brightly colored box beside Peggy, who sat in a circle of debris, noisy toys, and clothing. Peggy had spent all of breakfast bouncing in her seat, guessing excitedly at what might be in the large box. “And so’s this one.” She passed Harrison a squishy package, poorly wrapped and addressed to an indecipherable scribble.

“I guess the shop only wraps boxes,” he said wryly. He peered at the label, keeping it out of Sharon’s sight from where she sat cuddled on his lap. “Are you certain this is Sharon’s? I know there’s the stereotype doctors have bad handwriting, but I’m pretty certain this says ‘for Harrison’ not ‘for Sharon’.”

Sharon tilted her head backwards to frown up at him and reached for where he held the package away from her. “Mine!”

“Dinosaurs!”

He lowered the present into Sharon’s reaching hands and looked over to where Peggy had finished unwrapping her box. Paper crinkled noisily in Sharon’s grasp, but held firm against her tugging. Peggy’s box, on the other hand, was laid bare and tilted sideways to allow Peggy to pull out a large plastic bin with an Animal Planet logo and the head of a triceratops on it. “40 Pieces” was in big letters. Peggy excitedly started tugging off the tape sealing it closed.

“That’s a lot of dinosaurs, Peggles,” Harry asked as he tore off an impeding piece of tape so Sharon could wreak havoc upon the rest of the package. “What are you going to do with them all?”

“Dinosaur wars,” she said with the air of a child bent on attempting to play with every toy all at once. “Can I play with them now?”

“No, we need to clean up the room first,” Amanda said, getting up and pulling the kitchen trashcan over. “Oh, Sharon. Not in your mouth.”

“Pony!” was the garbled response around the ear stuffed in her mouth.

Harrison tilted his daughter to get a better look. A plush head poked its way out of the paper that still wrapped the rest of it. One ear was well moistened. Sharon shrieked in outrage at the manhandling and he settled her back down on his lap. “Okay, I won’t do that. But looks more like a bear than a pony, Sherry-baby.”

“I know you,” Amanda said, gently tugging the wrapping paper off of it. The stuffed animal in question wore a red bucket hat, a blue raincoat with brown toggles keeping it closed, and bright red galoshes. It had a round brown head with round brown ears, a small black triangle nose, and black button eyes. It bore no resemblance to a pony, especially not the brightly colored ponies of Sharon's favorite show. “It's a Paddington bear. Buck and I had one just like it when we were small too.”

“Pony,” Sharon said, curling the bear into a hug. “Mine.”

“Oh no, I wouldn’t take it, Sharon. Uncle Buchanan got him special for you, because he knows how much he loved his.”

“My Buck pony,” Sharon said, turning the bear around to peer intently at it. “Mine. No Peg.”

“Dinosaurs would eat him anyway,” Peggy said from where she sat balling up wrapping paper to throw at the trashcan.

“No eat,” Sharon said, hugging it again.

“Well how about we put the pony-bear down for now and find spots to put the toys away,” Harrison said, gently removing the bear from her grip. “And when everything is all clean, you can have him back.”

****

Amanda pulled the blanket up over her sleeping daughter.

“Harry did you put the bear in here?”

“No, it should still be out in the playpen with Sharon’s herd.”

“Maybe Peggy put it in here. I thought I told her to get the teething ring though.”

“Little help it was last night.”

Sharon curled the bear in closer, its ear firmly in her mouth.

****

“Don’t want to play dino wars,” Sharon said petulantly as Peggy dropped a shoebox into the playpen the toddler was sitting in. She shook a stuffed animal at her sister. “Want to play ponies.”

“We can do both,” Peggy said, climbing in. She sat down and started sorting through the stuffed animals crowding the playpen, obviously searching for something. “Ponies versus dinosaurs. I promise they won’t eat any ponies, but you have to promise not to put them in your mouth again.”

“Made my mouth feel better.”

“That’s what the gummy ring is for,” Peggy scolded as she pulled the ring off of a stuffed leg to toss at Sharon, who slid it onto her arm. Peggy heaved a sigh. “It’s not for bracelets.”

“Mouth not hurt now.”

“That’s good. You’ve been awfully cranky.” Sharon blew a raspberry at her. “How about a tea party?”

“Not thirsty. Cops and robbers. You be robbers.”

“You always make me be the robbers,” Peggy complained. “And when we’re done you sit on the box to keep them in jail.”

“Robbers bad people. Bad people go to jail,” Sharon said stubbornly.

“Well what about good robbers? Like Mister Rogers the spook next door?”

“Don’t want to be ghost. Tell Mama that you called Mister Rogers a robber.”

Peggy rolled her eyes. “ _Spook_ , Sharon. They’re called _spooks_. They steal things back from robbers to give to the cops.”

Sharon squished her face up angrily. “Ponies too nice to be spooks.”

“So _I’ll_ be the spooks.” Peggy looked cheerful at the opportunity to not play the bad guys for once.

Her sister had other ideas. “No! If you be spooks, I have to be robbers. Don’t want to be robbers.”

“Fine, I’ll be the robbers. And if you don’t want the ponies to be spooks, you could have Uncle Buck’s bear-”

“Pony,” Sharon corrected a quiet sullen tone.

“He’s a bear,” Peggy argued. “Look, he has paws and round ears and a triangle nose. None of the ponies have those. They’ve got lots of legs and hair and long pointy ears. Spike doesn't have those and you don’t see them calling him a pony, do you? Noooo, because he’s not a pony, he’s a dragon. And Uncle Buck’s present isn’t a pony, he’s a bear.”

Sharon made a rude noise.

“Anyway,” Peggy said loudly. “The bear can be the spook, and he reports to the ponies, who can be the cops.” Peggy picked up the bear, tugging at the blue coat he wore. “He needs spook clothes though. And a mask. So that nobody can find him in the dark.”

A large shadow loomed over them and the duo fell silent to stare up at the newcomer. A blonde young woman stood beside the playpen, cupping her stomach as she peered down at them. “You two behaving yourselves? I heard raised voices.”

“Yes, Missus Rogers,” Peggy said. Sharon nodded vigorously in agreement. “We’re playing spooks, like Mister Rogers.”

The woman looked confused. “Spooks? Like- oh, oh I see. I suppose federal agent is a bit of a mouthful. How do you play?”

“Rar!” Sharon said, sending a stuffed pony into a dive bomb at the shoebox containing the dinosaurs. Plastic dinosaurs exploded out of the box, making space for the invader. Missus Rogers covered her mouth with a hand and Peggy sighed.

“She wants to play cops and robbers, but I thought we could try new things and have the bear be a spook but he doesn’t have spook clothes.” She raised the bear up, showing off its offending clothes.

Missus Rogers peered closely at him, taking in the red cap and wellies and blue coat. “Well what should he be wearing?”

“A mask, so that no one knows who he really is. Like when Mister Rogers says he’s other people so nobody can find you and your baby.”

The woman’s arms tightened momentarily under her stomach before letting it go.

She sat down carefully beside the playpen so the girls could stop craning their necks up, and they scooted closer to her. “He doesn’t wear a mask for that, Peggy. But I suppose dolls should show their jobs better than live people do. So what color should this mask be?”

“Wed,” Sharon said, patting the bear’s hat.

“Black,” Peggy argued. “So nobody finds him in the dark.”

“Actually, blue is much better for hiding in the shadows than black, because shadows aren’t actually completely black,” Missus Rogers explained. “That’s how you can spot monsters in the dark. They’re all black, and not the same color as shadows.”

Peggy scrunched her nose up, unsure.

“Wed,” argued Sharon. “Like wed.”

“Well what about a black mask, so that he’ll blend in with the robbers, but then red gloves to hide his fingerprints? No fingerprint is alike and the cops have machines that store everybody’s prints. And of course robbers sometimes steal them, so they might find out his secret identity that way.”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s a great idea! And his coat’s blue, so I guess that’s spook colored enough. But he needs pants. Mister Rogers always wears pants. And Mum always makes Sharon put hers back on.”

The woman laughed. “Yes, trousers are important. I probably have enough fabric at home to make him a new uniform, but I’d have to take him with me when I go. Will that be all right, Sharon?”

“‘Kay,” Sharon said placidly around the teething ring she was gnawing on. “Ponies.”

“She doesn’t play with him much,” Peggy explained. “She likes the ponies better. Mum says she and Uncle Buck had a bear like him when they were small.”

“Paddington has been caring for children for a very long time,” Missus Rogers agreed. “If he’s going to be a spook, should he get a new name? Or does he already have a new name?”

“Oh, like Mister Rogers’ fake people?” Peggy asked. “Sharon calls him Buck’s pony, since Uncle Buck gave him to her.” She paused, then covered the side of her mouth and leaned towards Missus Rogers and said in a loud whisper, “I don’t think she’s learned bear yet.”

“My Buck’s pony,” Sharon agreed, tugging the bear out of Peggy’s hands.

“Hey!”

“No, Peggy, it’s her toy,” the woman said, trying to head the impending tantrum off. “But Sharon, it’s not nice to snatch things out of your sister’s hands either. You wouldn’t like it if I snatched your toy out of your hands, would you?”

“No,” Sharon mumbled. “Mine.”

“I know you don’t have a lot of words yet, but ‘please’ is very important. I’m sure Peggy would have given him back if you’d asked.” Peggy nodded vigorously. “Always remember that in the end, kindness will get you more than being mean will.”

****

“Can you get this box down for me, Joseph? I remember you saying something about doctor prescribed bed rest means no climbing furniture to prove I’m still well.”

“You’re also supposed to actually stay lying down, not babysitting toddlers.”

“Joseph.”

“All right, I promised not to argue about this again. What’s with the bear?”

She giggled softly. “Peggy and Sharon want to make him a spook like you.”

“Spook? Harry complaining about the government around little ears again?”

“Probably. When are they sending you out again?”

“Next week. Some sort of exchange in Russia. Do you know where I stashed my parka?”

****

“You don’t know how much we appreciate your time, Sarah,” Amanda said over dinner. Sharon was busy stirring her chopped spaghetti into an even color, while Peggy was slurping hers up, one noodle at a time. Thankfully Peggy had agreed to the compromise that she could slurp her noodles, but only if she stopped eating them with her fingers. “I know what we pay you is nothing compared to-”

“No, please. “With having to take maternity leave so early, I need something to keep me busy. I’d do this for free if you let me.” Amanda and Harry shook their heads in unison. “And your girls are so well-behaved. I hope my little one will be just like them.”

“Have the doctors figured out why you’re having so many problems?” Harry asked.

She shook her head. “Nothing conclusive. It makes me worry that-” She paused, lowered her head. “Can I pass on this conversation?” she whispered.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked,” Harry said quickly. “It’s none of our business, and I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No, you didn’t. I haven’t been able to think about anything else, but saying it out loud would make it more real.”

“Is there anything we can do to ease you?” Amanda asked, laying a hand on her arm.

“Invent a time machine to see into the future and tell me all will be well with my baby?” Sarah said, forcing a half-smile onto her face.

Peggy stopped mid-slurp to stare with wide eyes at her. Part of the noodle clung wetly to her face. “Is the baby sick?”

Harry mimed a chewing motion at his daughter, and she slurped the noodle up shamefacedly.

“No,” Sarah replied. “But my body isn’t behaving well with the baby in it. That’s why I’ve been watching you two instead of working at the hospital. The doctors don’t want me to tire my body.”

“Then shouldn’t you be in bed? Mum keeps me in bed when I don’t feel well.”

“No, the baby isn’t supposed to come out for many months, and the doctors don’t think I should stay in bed that long,” Sarah explained.

“Peggy, let her finish her dinner. And you should finish yours,” Amanda said.

“Sorry, Missus Rogers.”

“No it’s all right. Now you’ll know to keep an eye on me just like I keep an eye on you and Sharon.” She turned to Harry. “Have you taught her how to use the phone?”

“Oh ages ago,” Harry said with a laugh. “It took longer to teach her not to call me at work unless it was a proper emergency, and not an ‘I can’t find my shoes’ emergency.”

“I didn’t!”

“Oh, right, it was your coat, wasn’t it?” He tweaked her nose.

“Mum make Da stop!”

“Harry eat your dinner and stop teasing your daughter,” Amanda intoned dutifully. “And Peggy, if anything happens to Missus Rogers when she’s watching you, call me and I’ll be right here.”

“Amanda,” Sarah started.

“No, you were right to wonder if she knows how to phone in case of emergencies. This pregnancy hasn’t been easy for you, and if you’re going to be here a lot, she needs to know what to do if you’re in trouble. If she calls me, I can come back to get them while you go to the hospital. You know the girls can’t get on the bus with you.”

“Yeah, that’s true. I just don’t want her traumatized.”

“Mademoiselle Margaret’s a trooper. Remember when young Cain Marko down the street broke his arm falling out of a tree? Peggy here was a first responder. Sent his playmates off to find a parent and had him sit up and hold his arm above his head while she held an icepack to it.”

“Missus Rogers said cold makes things shrink,” Peggy mumbled shyly to her empty plate. “And that if you’re bleeding, you should hold it above your heart. And then find a grown up.”

“That was very clever of you to remember,” Sarah said approvingly. “I think I was working nights and sleeping days then. I missed the whole thing, though I did see Cain out with his parents and his brother. He had a red cast and was shouting about becoming invincible so it wouldn’t happen again.”

“Down,” Sharon said, finished with her meal. Both face and plate were liberally painted with sauce, though she had managed to finish her noodles.

“Bath time for baby,” Harry said, wiping at her face with a napkin in a vain attempt to clean some of her off.

“No! Play!”

“We don’t want your toys covered with food, Sherry-baby. Can you take care of this while I take care of her, Amanda?” he asked, scooping her out of the high chair.

Amanda stood, gathering dishes. “Of course. Sarah, could you keep Peggy company in the living room? Or I suppose I can release you out into the wilds. Wouldn’t want you to feel trapped here.”

“It’s no bother. You know the house feels empty with Joseph on assignment.”

“You can stay with us,” Peggy offered. “You can have my bed, and I can sleep on the sofa.”

“You just want to watch cartoons when we're all too asleep to stop you,” Amanda scolded. “But your heart's in the right place. You're part of the family too, Sarah. Never be afraid of your welcome with us. You or Joseph.”

Sarah flushed. “You don't know how much we appreciate that. With all the family back in the old country-” she trailed off. “It's been difficult.”

“You'll eventually get used to it, moving as the job requires it. You never stop missing family though.”

Amanda headed for the kitchen, her arms laden with dishes, and Sarah offered Peggy a hand. “Want to see the bear's new duds or do you want to wait until Sharon's done with her bath?”

Peggy made an unintelligible excited noise. “You're done? That's so fast! I want to see him now!” She started dragging Sarah towards the living room.

“Easy there, tiger,” Sarah said, tugging back on Peggy's hand in warning. “Rushing doesn't get you there that much faster.”

“Sorry!” She slowed down, hopping excitedly beside Sarah as the woman walked more sedately to the entrance table where her purse sat. “Did you leave him in your bag? It didn't look bigger.”

“Bags don't look bigger until they're completely stuffed. Mine's only a little stuffed.” She picked it up and eased the bear out of her bag. She handed it to Peggy.

“It's perfect! He looks so cool!” The girl cried, turning him over in her hands. The bucket hat was gone, replaced with a black bandit mask. The coat had been trimmed, its toggles exchanged for big red buttons, and its collar replaced with a red one. The new gloves were the same red fabric as the collar. Gone were the rain boots, and instead he had red trousers and small blue boots.

“His boots didn't match the fabric I had,” Sarah said in an apologetic tone. “So I shortened his coat to use to make him new shoes.”

“That's okay, nobody wears wellies for work.”

“The postman might,” Sarah said with a giggle.

“But he's going to be a spook, not deliver mail.”

“Right.”

“Thank you so much, Missus Rogers!” Peggy glomped onto the woman's leg, squeezing tightly.

Sarah pried her off her leg and picked her up to give her a proper full-body hug. “You're quite welcome, Mademoiselle Margaret,” she murmured into Peggy's blonde hair. “Just be certain to remember to share him. He's Sharon's Buck-pony-bear-thing, after all.”

“We decided on Bucky Bear,” Peggy said, leaning out of the hug to look at the woman. “She still can't say bear, but she can do Bucky. And now she'll stop calling him a pony. 'Cause he's not.”

****

“I miss Missus Rogers,” Sharon pouted, staring out of the playpen at the teenager engrossed with typing on his laptop. Strange shrieking noises came from it occasionally. “She'd play with us.”

Missus Rogers hadn't come by one early July day, instead calling their house and sending Da rushing out of the house in a panic while Mum called other parents to see if anyone knew a good sitter available right away. By the end of the day, the grill had been put back in the garage unused, the food back in the fridge, and the sparklers stored with a promise to use them for when Missus Rogers and the baby came home.

July was almost over and she had yet to return, though Mister Rogers had come back special from his last trip to see her and the new baby. Sitters had rotated quickly through their house, none of them up to the high standard their kind neighbor had set. This latest one had plopped both of them into the playpen after their parents had left for work and raised it too high for Peggy to climb out, even though Mum had specifically told him she was free to roam the house.

“I don't want to play with Mikey Korvac. His games are dumb,” Peggy said, throwing a stuffed pony at the enclosure in his direction. It bounced harmlessly off. Sharon gave a shriek of outrage and dragged the rest out of her sister’s reach.

“Mine!” She cried, clutching her favorite to her chest. “Not yours to throw.”

“Sorry. You can throw one at him next time.”

“That’s right,” Sharon said, nodding her head emphatically. “Make him go away for good. And bring Missus Rogers back.”

“Mum says it might not be for days and days and days.”

“Why'd she have to have a baby, doesn't she like us?”

“We're not her babies. She has to share with Mum and Da. Her baby is just for her and Mister Rogers,” Peggy explained.

“But she hasn't come forever and ever.”

“That's 'cause she's still at the hospital. Her baby came too early and he needs to be on machines and she needs to be with him. I'd hate to be at hospital without Mum.”

“Scary,” agreed Sharon. “I want to go with Mum and Da next time. If I promise not to scream this time, would they bring us?”

“No. You never not scream at the hospital.”

“Do not.”

“Do too.”

“Do not.”

“Do too.”

“Do not. Do not. Do not. Do not!” Sharon shrieked, pushing Peggy.

“Pipe down, babies! The cosmos doesn’t conquer itself you know!”

They stopped to glare in the direction of the boy again.

“I want Missus Rogers back,” Peggy said.

“Uncle Buck could fix the baby,” Sharon said. “He's a doctor.”

“Don’t babies have special doctors? Da sees a different doctor than we do, what if Uncle Buck is like Da’s doctor, not ours?”

“All doctors do all doctoring,” Sharon argued. “Do you think Bucky knows how to be a doctor? Like how Applejack knows how to be a farmer because her family is farmers? Cause my mouth hurts less since I got him.”

Peggy cocked her head, considering. “I bet he does. Plus, as a spook, he has to know all the jobs so he can pretend to actually be them. Mister Rogers says the only reason you should be caught lying is when you don’t mind the con-see-quen-says.” She enunciated the word carefully. “And then he said not to tell anyone he said that, so don’t tell anyone I told you that.”

“Have to promise you don’t let Mum take Dum Dum home from preschool again,” Sharon haggled. “I don’t like him, he pinches.”

“Fine,” Peggy said sullenly. She crossed her arms over her chest and muttered, “It was only the one time because his gran was at the doctor.”

“We should give Bucky to the baby to make him feel better. It can be a birthday present!”

“I'll ask Mum when she gets home. I bet she'd take him there for us. And maybe Missus Rogers will send hugs back as thanks.”

“She has the best hugs,” Sharon said seriously. “Let's go find a box to put him in so that they'll know he's a present.”

“We'd get in trouble with Mikey,” Peggy warned.

Sharon blew a raspberry. “Poo on him. Where's the button to make it open?”

Peggy hopped up and started fiddling with one of the poles. “This is going to be just like real spooks!”

“I said sorry for fighting about it.” Sharon said, crawling over to the Peggy's side and dragging herself up into a standing position.

“I'm never going to forget it, never ever. Because you cried the first time I made you play, even though Missus Rogers dressed up Bucky just for you, and now you love spooks and robbers more than cops and robbers.”

One side of the playpen collapsed noisily. They stared at each, horrified, and turned in unison to see if Michael was coming to investigate.

“Argh, Stakar if you kill-steal from me again, I will end you!” he shouted from the living room, tapping at his laptop furiously. He didn’t seem to have heard the noise, or else wasn’t curious about it.

“Shhhh,” Sharon said, putting a finger to her lips.

“You shhhh,” Peggy piped back. “And don't forget Bucky. We need to check the boxes to see if he fits.”

Sharon toddled over to the bear, picked him up, and tucked him under an arm.

They looked back at Michael. His game held his complete attention and Peggy cautiously tiptoed over the fallen playpen wall.

“Spooks escaping the Mikey jail!” whispered Sharon, following after her.

****

In a corner of the hospital nursery, there was a small mechanical respirator enclosed in a glass box with an even smaller baby quietly wheezing inside of it. The name on the chart hanging beside it said “Rogers, Steven” and the nurses all worried about who would be the one to tell his ailing mother the chances that he'd live long enough, even on their machines, for his little lungs to finish developing.

“Twenty-three weeks is far too early,” murmured one, peering towards the nursery. The Rogers baby had only two others for company. One was the first of several Summers’ babies due, and the other a sour-faced boy whose metal crib bars had twisted every time he cried before they’d found a plastic crib to put him in.

“I'm sorry I made that joke about wishing some of our mothers would deliver early because we're expecting so many this autumn. The snowstorm last winter wreaked havoc on our usual schedule.” A few of the other nurses tittered.

“It’s been weeks since she delivered him and she's still so frail.”

“Considering her medical history, I'm surprised she kept trying to have one.”

“Shhhh, someone's coming.”

The gathered nurses scattered to return to their assigned duties as an attractive couple arrived to peer into the window at the newborns kept within. The woman had a glitter-covered box held carefully in her hands, and the man wrapped an arm around her as she made a soft noise in the back of her throat.

“I knew she was having problems,” the woman murmured. “But this is so much worse than I thought.”

“They're still keeping her in this wing, come along.”

They walked further into the ward until coming to a door labeled “Rogers, Sarah” and tapped on it before stepping in.

“Hey sleepyhead,” the man said.

Sarah Rogers was wan and thin, her face haggard, and she trembled as she pushed herself into a more upright position.

“Harry, Amanda,” she greeted softly, smiling at them.

“Don’t get up on our account,” Harry said, moving quickly to her side.

“Have the doctors okayed you for presents?” Amanda asked, waving the sparkling box. “Peggy and Sharon sent something along for you and the baby.”

“How sweet of them,” Sarah said, taking the box carefully. Glitter flaked off. ‘Whoops.”

“I brought a bag to put the box in, actually.” Amanda pulled a folded-up green reusable grocery bag out of her purse. “We took it out in the car so most the mess would be out there instead of here.”

“It shed a lot,” Harry added. “Amanda was pretty careful with it on the walk up though.”

Sarah carefully lifted the top and handed it to Amanda, who eased it into the green bag. She laughed as she peered into the box.

“I got him the coat,” Amanda said as Sarah pulled out a stuffed bear in a lab coat and a bandit mask. The clothing Sarah had sewn for him peeked out from underneath the white coat.

“Sharon’s Bucky Bear?”

“Peggy said that since Buchanan is a doctor, the bear knows how to be a doctor too,” Harry said with a grin. “Also something about spooks, which I didn’t understand.”

“Peggy overheard someone describing Joseph’s job as being a government spook,” Sarah responded, frowning in Harry’s direction as she petted the bear. “I wonder where she learned that from.”

Harry raised his hands in surrender. “It was just the one time, I swear.”

“So he’s to be Doctor Bucky Bear now, is he?” Sarah mused, petting the bear’s soft head. “I wonder if I have to keep him with me or if he can join Steven in his machine.”

“Probably not _in_ it,” Harry said. “There’s no telling what germs are on him.”

“It’s been in Sharon’s mouth too many times to be germ-free. Her teeth have mostly finished breaking through, but she still tends to put everything in her mouth,” Amanda added. “The last thing newborns need to be around is a toddler’s’ germs.”

Sarah shrugged. “The newborns are probably safe. They’re being breastfed, so they’re working off mom’s immune system. But Steven can’t breathe off the machine and they’ve been giving him his food intravenously.”

“He won’t have that protection,” Harry said softly.

“Guess you’ll just be looking after me for now, Doctor Bucky,” Sarah addressed to the bear. She set him carefully on the bed monitor. “That should give you a good view of the readings.”

Amanda snapped a picture of bear, patient, and machines. “For evidence,” she explained. “I think the girls will be pleased with his job transfer.”

“Do thank them for me,” Sarah said. “And give them both big hugs from me. And tiny ones from Steven.”

Amanda giggled. “We can do that. They’ll probably be disappointed Steven can’t have the bear yet.”

“Once he gets home, it can start off his own collection of too many plushes,” Sarah said with a giggle.

“Sometimes I think the only reason Sharon loves ponies so much is because Buchanan’s been the only friend to get her something _not_ a pony,” Harry said, rolling his eyes.

“It’s going to be all bears for little Steven now,” Amanda added. “Just you watch.”

****

In the harsh fluorescent hospital lights of the neonatal care unit, a lone stuffed bear, lab coat missing, sat watch on the top of an incubator, a tiny baby inside. The quiet noises of babies breathing and machinery beeping echoed through the long room.

In the incubator under the care of the CPAP and the bear, Steve Rogers inhaled under his own power for the first time.


End file.
